Butcha Steakhouse and Grill

Continuing to up the ante in JBR’s restaurant game comes the Butcha Steakhouse and Grill – joining The Beach area’s slew of stylish, relaxed eateries.

An export from Turkey, Butcha’s famous on site, dry-age meat curing has had mouths salivating and tongues wagging from Istanbul to Ankura for a while now. And so, to keep the restaurant’s tradition, the JBR incarnation is the only certified restaurant in the city to have the facilities to recreate this meat curing process in-house, as well.

The proof is resolutely in the pudding, evident from the outset in the starter selection of smoked beef, lamb and bresaola cold cuts, beef carpaccio, and moreish tasting samplers of spicy sucuk and kofte and merguez sausage. Should you plan to go big on your steak mains and wish to avoid the meat sweats too early on however, then the spicy tigers prove a fantastic alternative.

Butcha’s flagship offerings are, of course, its steak mains – extending from tenderloin to T-Bone, Ribe Eye, Entrecote, Porterhouse and the NY strip. Grad 8-9 Wagyu is also there, but dependent on availability. Notably cheery waiting staff are also readily at hand, offering guidance as to cuts for indecisive types, or those simply looking to learn a bit about what part of the cow their meal is coming from, which is no bad thing as a life skill of sorts. There’s even a massive diagram of the beast’s anatomy on the wall, if you’re in the market for a quick schooling.

In truth, such is the standard and prowess to which the meat is prepared, executed and dished out, it doesn’t really matter which steak you select (dry aged or otherwise). Uniformly tasty, sucucclenent and bolstered by a relatively classic selection of sauces – bar the viscous blue cheese and mustard offering, which we hadn’t come across before.

An excellent range of handmade burgers also feature – a solid shout at sub Dhs75 for all – alongside an ever more substantial, ‘Gourmet selection ‘of various meats. This extended section of the menu plays home to various takes on chicken, lamb and beef, from Woodfired BBQ ribs and spicy suck sausage, across to garlic marinated steak and chargrilled chicken shish.

All of this, secondary to the main piece of Butcha’s show, the Chef’s signature whole tenderloin - a beautifully cooked, colossal sized slab fit for up to four diners.

If you take one thing away from Butcha, (asides from another cut of meat, sold in the restaurant should you wish to attempt to replicate your experience with some home cooking) it’s that in this region, you shouldn’t be unduly snobbish about your steak.

The JBR-based establishment proves to be not only a categorically enjoyable restaurant in its own right, but also serves as slap across the face to those who’d claim they can’t get a good cut of meat outside the city’s more up-scale, twice the price, steakhouses.